Beck, who replaced Eric Clapton with the Yardbirds, was 78 and died on January 10. Shortly before his death, the guitarist contracted bacterial meningitis, his representatives said.
British guitarist Jeff Beck, whom Rolling Stone calls “guitar god”, died on January 10 at the age of 79, a message appeared on the musician’s website.
“After unexpectedly contracting bacterial meningitis, he passed away peacefully yesterday,” the statement said. Posted on January 11th.
Beck was born in 1944 in London, writes the Guardian. He sang in the church choir as a child and began playing the guitar as a teenager. The first band the musician joined was Screaming Lord Sutch. Then one of the founders of Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Page, invited him to the Yardbirds, where Beck replaced guitarist Eric Clapton. Beck was a member of the band for 20 months, during which the band released the 1966 album Yardbirds and the No. 3 single Shapes of Things. In the same year, Beck left the group.
In 1968, Beck released his first solo album, Truth, which included blues and hard rock compositions. After that, the musician created The Jeff Beck Group, with which a year later he released the Beck-Ola compilation.
Subsequently, Beck was involved in an accident and sustained a head injury. By 1970, the musician recovered from it and reassembled the group. With it, he released two more albums – Rough and Ready (1971) and Jeff Beck Group (1972) in the jazz fusion genre, thanks to which the musician gained fame.
In the mid-70s, Beck went on tour with the jazz-rock band Mahavishnu Orchestra. Impressed by him, he created the album Blow, By Blow in the same genre. The album was certified platinum and peaked at number four on the US charts. The Guardian calls this album Beck’s most commercially successful compilation.
Later, the musician released several more albums, including Wired (1976) and There and Back (1980). In the 1980s, he began to work less intensively, as he suffered from ringing in his ears, the newspaper writes. In 1985 and 1989, Beck released two more compilations, Flash and Jeff Beck’s Guitar Shop, which became his last solo album. Subsequently, the guitarist refocused on the genres of pop, techno and electronic music.
Beck has collaborated with artists such as Jon Bon Jovi, Kate Bush and Roger Waters, Kelly Clarkson and Johnny Depp. He released his latest album 18 with Depp in 2022.
Beck received a total of eight Grammy Awards and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
